[Lingtyp] what is designated by a complement claus

[Juergen Bohnemeyer]

Dear Lixin – OK, “I’ll bite” (i.e., let me try):

What is meant by ‘complements’ in this thread are subordinate clauses or verbal projections that are semantically (if not necessarily syntactically, depending on your favorite theory of syntax) arguments of their matrix predicates.

This notion of ‘complements’ overlaps with that of Dependency Grammar, which designates any and all syntactic arguments.

So if one assumes that all complements in the first sense are syntactic arguments (an assumption not shared, for example, in Roll & Reference Grammar), then under this assumption, complements in the first sense are a subclass of complements in the second sense.

Does this help at all? – Best – Juergen

Juergen Bohnemeyer (He/Him)
Professor, Department of Linguistics
University at Buffalo

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From: Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of Lixin Jin <jinlixin at hotmail.com>
Date: Tuesday, May 9, 2023 at 8:13 AM
To: lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Subject: [Lingtyp] what is designated by a complement claus
Dear Colleagues，

The extension of the concept of complement is a bit ambiguous. I don't even know how to determine what a complement is sometimes. Perhaps different languages have different complements (e.g. Chinese complements). What is the definition of "complement" we are talking about? Are the logical criteria for determining complements the same as those for attributive and adverbial? It would be interesting to know. Thanks!

Lixin
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